


Keeping Occupied

by sagansjagger



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Adrien Agreste/Marinette Dupain-Cheng Fluff, Adults, Aged-Up Character(s), F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Light Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-20
Updated: 2020-08-20
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:28:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26003416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sagansjagger/pseuds/sagansjagger
Summary: Adrien Agreste puts the fun in functional.His job as a pediatric occupational therapist is heart-pounding, heart-breaking, and heart-warming all at once. He enjoys helping children learn the skills they need to be mature, functioning adults.And someone else appreciates him for it, too...
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Comments: 41
Kudos: 153





	Keeping Occupied

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Missnoodles](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Missnoodles/gifts).



> A love letter to my dear friend, [missnoodles](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Missnoodles/pseuds/Missnoodles). 
> 
> Noodles is a fantastic author in her own right, with a gorgeous work called [our hands would not be taught to hold another's](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25014856/chapters/60572590), which takes a salt fic premise and turns it into something unique and beautiful. Go check her out!

"Well, aren't you perky this morning?" Janice, Adrien's coworker at the sensory integration clinic, told him with a laugh. 

He beamed at her, shifting the large box of doughnuts under his arm. "You know me, Janice," he said, beaming brightly at her. "I'm always perky in the mornings."

"I don't know how, since you only drink lemon water," Janice said, squinting at him. "Are you sure I can't convince you to join the coffee cult like the rest of us?"

Adrien chuckled and opened the box. "Have a doughnut, Janice?"

Janice chose a glazed twist. "Thanks. Is it really Friday already?"

"Welcome to Friday," Adrien said, grinning as he closed the box. "That's why I brought doughnuts."

"You always do," Janice said, reaching out with her free hand to pat his cheek. "You coming with the rest of us to drinks tonight?"

"I actually promised to check in with a friend this evening," Adrien said, shaking his head. "But thanks for the offer." He started walking into the clinic proper and waved over his shoulder. "I've got to put these doughnuts in the break room and grab my charts for the day. See you, Janice!"

"Take care, Adrien," Janice called.

He set the doughnuts down on the counter in the break room and retreated to his office to pick up his charts for the clients he’d be seeing that day. As a Pediatric Occupational Therapist, Adrien’s job was anything but boring. 

Despite having a routine in place--chart, patient, note, repeat--every day was different. His days had just enough variety to keep him engaged and on his toes, despite having a predictable structure.

His job was to assist children in developing the skills they needed to be functional adults. He was able to help kids with developmental delays learn how to write, speak, and self-regulate. If the client was mentally capable of a skill, Adrien reinforced their ability. 

The sensory integration clinic provided speech, physical, and occupational therapies for children, primarily kids with autism, ADHD, and Down syndrome. But he’d also worked with clients with sensory processing issues, rare genetic disorders, epidural hematomas, connective tissue disorders, and uncommon cancers. The diseased children were the saddest.

Adrien loved his kids. He’d always wanted children of his own, but being still single at 31, parenthood was a far-off dream.

Adrien was the only male therapist in the clinic. His coworkers were all charming and charmed by him in turn. That Friday, according to his charts, he had a caseload of eight clients. _Yup, sounds about right._ He normally had nine. Fridays were the "easy" day. 

At 8am, he equipped himself for the day. He set up mats in the OT gym. HE gathered the therapy equipment he might need--like swings, stress balls, and thick markers. He printed Cars, Frozen, and Peppa Pig-themed coloring pages. 

As usual, he didn’t have time to check his email before his first patient arrived at 9am: a 4 ½ year old girl with fine motor delays and low muscle tone and endurance. 

“Hi, Lea!” Adrien said, crouching down as the girl rushed up to give him her usual hug. He never offered embraces to his clients, but he never refused them, either. “Are you ready to make snowflakes today like Elsa?”

“Elsa!” Lea squealed, bouncing on the balls of her feet. “I want to be Elsa! You can be Anna!”

“Okay!” Adrien said, grinning from ear to ear. He spent the next ten minutes practicing cutting with Lea, showing her how to make snowflakes out of construction paper. 

They transitioned to painting the snowflakes with thick brushes. Lea was still too young to hold the paintbrush like she would a pencil, so while Adrien demonstrated the “correct” way to hold the brush, he didn’t expect her to try. To his surprise, she did. Not surprising at all, she got frustrated.

“I can’t do it!” she screeched, and threw the paintbrush full of blue paint onto the floor.

“Hey, it’s okay, Elsa! We’ll work on that later, all right?” Adrien said cheerily, cleaning up the mess with paper towels he retrieved from the counter by the sink. “In the meantime, do you want to make Olaf with playdough?”

Lea calmed down for the rest of the session, rolling balls out of the playdough for him with a modicum of success. She’d definitely showed some progress over the last few sessions, which meant her mom was doing the exercises he prescribed at home for Lea. 

He breathed a sigh of relief. Abrielle, Lea’s mother, was a single mom and stressed to the max, so to know that she was spending the time to help her daughter at home when so many parents didn’t was great news.

As Lea transferred water between cups with an eye dropper, Adrien caught up with Abrielle. 

“Lea did beautifully this session,” Adrien told her mother, and happily recounted the highlights, including that Lea had made eight balls of playdough before getting bored. “If you can, I’d like you to have her make snakes out of playdough and do the sponge exercise this week.”

The sponge exercise was simple enough for parents to do at home. All it required was two bowls, a sponge, and some water. The child would dip the sponge in a bowl full of water and squeeze the liquid out into the other, empty bowl. Ideally, Lea could strengthen her hands and forearms.

“I can do that.” Abrielle took Lea’s hand, but turned back to Adrien just as they were about to leave. “Are you sure you’re not free to go out this weekend? You’re just so nice, and you’re so good with my daughter. She’s really improving because of you. Think about it?”

Adrien smiled. “Thank you! But I’m sorry, madame--I don’t date parents of clients. Mixing business and pleasure never ended well for anyone.”

Abrielle offered him a sad, soft return smile. “I get it. Maybe next week.”

“Take care and good luck, madame,” Adrien said, waving them off. He sped back to his office and spent the last ten minutes of the hour writing as much of the treatment note from the previous session as possible. He didn’t even come close to finishing it before he had to grab the next client’s chart and set up for the next session.

“Hi, Ethan,” Adrien said softly, trying not to scare the 2 ½-year-old boy who clung to his mother’s legs as she entered. As usual, Ethan didn’t meet Adrien’s eye. Nor did the boy ever follow his parents’ gazes, or those of anyone else. “Are you ready to play?”

Adrien didn’t expect an answer. Ethan had a medical diagnosis of autism and had so far presented as nonverbal. He had a very, very limited set of tools to communicate at his disposal, and it was Adrien’s job to try and expand that set.

Adrien started their routine, which he rarely deviated from without a lot of warning. He crawled around Ethan’s mother, Jade, and held up a resistance band. “This is called a resistance band, Ethan. Would you like it?” The boy took the band without looking at Adrien and started pulling on it. 

Ethan had vestibular and proprioceptive-seeking patterns, which meant he rocked, swayed, and sought out deep pressure, rough play like stomping, and working against resistance. He also bit, scratched, and pinched himself and others, as well as banged his head against walls and doors. Adrien was always careful with him.

Adrien got to his feet and smiled at Jade. “Good morning, madame! Are you planning to stay for this session?”

“Of course, Adrien,” Jade said, sighing. The weight of the world bent her shoulders. Jade was another single mother, and she always seemed exhausted and dejected with all the things on her to-do list she had to manage. She’d stopped hitting on him a while ago. “You know I always do.”

“I have to ask,” Adrien said, his smile softening. “So, how were the exercises this past week?”

“We didn’t do them,” Jade said, and Adrien’s heart sank. She cast her gaze to the floor, hunching her shoulders. “I didn’t have time.”

“That’s okay,” Adrien said, glancing down at Ethan, who was fiercely tugging on the band with his teeth. “Maybe you can work on them this week. Can we try the coat this time?”

Jade shrugged. “Sure.”

Adrien crouched down to look at Ethan, who again didn’t meet his eye. “Ethan, I’d like you to try to remove your shoes. Is that okay?”

Ethan didn’t respond, so Adrien untied his own shoes and slipped them off. Ethan’s shoes didn’t have laces, but Adrien wanted him to slip them off and on anyway. After gently taking the resistance band away from Ethan, Adrien tried to get him to remove his shoes for a few minutes, with Jade’s help. After a great deal of coaxing from the adults, Ethan took one shoe off.

“Great job, Ethan!” Adrien said quietly, trying to praise the boy without overstimulating him with noise. “Okay, your mom is going to put your shoe back on and we’re going to try jumping, all right?”

Ethan seemed to like jumping in place and playing hopscotch a lot better than he did the shoe activity, which Adrien expected and was glad about. Adrien had the boy stack cubes, pull on clinic-provided overpants and take them off, and remove his unfastened coat. Adrien and Jade and Ethan played with playdough, button snakes, and spray bottles. Adrien even had Ethan transfer Cheerios from one bowl to the other one at a time.

Adrien kept up a running commentary the entire time to both Ethan and Jade, narrating what he was doing and about to do and explaining to Ethan’s mother how to meet the boy’s sensory needs. By the time the session was over, Adrien’s throat was dry and his voice was scratchy.

Adrien forewent his session note to clean up the OT gym and take a quick breather. He downed two bottles of water, ate a maple bar doughnut, and used the restroom. Then it was admin time.

He finished the treatment note from the 10am session. He wrote up a home program for a client he started working on a few weeks ago. He checked and responded to his emails. Then he prepped the materials for his afternoon clients and reviewed his charts again.

Lunch arrived sooner than he’d like--he still had a note to do!--but Adrien was starving and needed a break. He drove out to his favorite cafe, one Marinette had shown him when she wasn’t so busy, and picked up a pre-made salad to take back to work. 

He typically met up with Janice and the other therapists during lunch to catch up, but the clinic was deserted by the time he returned. _Hmm. They must have gone to the coffee shop._

He ate his salad outside in the sensory garden he’d built himself for the clinic. Sitting on the mossy ground and brushing the fingers of one hand over it, Adrien scrolled through Facebook on his phone with the other. 

Nino and Alya were still on their honeymoon in Tahiti, posting picture after picture of gorgeous blue water and pristine white beaches. Chloé was also on holiday in Morocco, taking a much-needed vacation from her high-profile job as a partnered lawyer and her low-profile hobby of beekeeping. 

But the most interesting Facebook newsfeed was Marinette Dupain-Cheng’s. She’d accepted a fashion internship at Chanel Paris but had struggled to rocket to the top like she wanted to. She also volunteered at an animal shelter and as a mentor to kids needing assistance in English classes. 

Adrien’s favorite posts were of her at home, showing peeks inside her studio and her own, new creations, be they food, fashion, or furniture.

She also patrolled with him once a month. He had no idea how she got so much done. Now that Hawkmoth had been defeated and Gabriel Agreste arrested, Chat and Ladybug had been needed by their city less and less.

Adrien was grateful for that, but he missed his Lady. He still had a soft spot for her after all these years, having always loved Ladybug and having fallen in love with Marinette herself in lycee. But he’d missed his chance. She never seemed ready for a relationship after her mutual breakup with Luka, and Adrien was too much of a canned chicken to ask her out, wanting her to take the lead.

So he admired her from afar, looking forward to their patrol nights more than any other night of the month.

As he’d indirectly told Janice, tonight was one of those nights.

Pausing at another gorgeous selfie of Marinette with a green paint splotch on her cheek, Adrien sighed dreamily. He lifted his fingers from the moss and touched the screen as if wiping off the paint. _Would that I could, Marinette. Would that I could..._

With that thought, Adrien stood and collected his compostable salad bowl. He disposed of it in the appropriate bin inside, and prepped for his next client: a 15-year-old with Oppositional Defiant Disorder and sensory processing issues.

Adam was a tough client. Adrien was forced to remain cheerful and playful while the kid screamed at him for most of an hour every session. Adrien presented him with various options: would Adam like to play This Game is Bonkers? No. Would Adam like to bounce on the yoga ball? No. Would Adam like a cheese snack? No.

Would Adam like to yell into a pillow rather than at Adrien?

Out of respect for his client, Adrien didn’t present that one.

There was progress, though. Adam broke down in tears and admitted he was struggling in school. Adrien coached him through coping strategies he could use to better manage his temper while facing his teachers. 

After the session, Adrien caught up with Adam’s mother, Beatrix and told her about the positive highlight of the session while Adam looked on, his arms folded and his eyes hard. “... Adam is still a new client to me, madame, but we’re already seeing progress. After he gets used to me, maybe we’ll start to see more.”

“Doubt it,” Adam spat.

His mother ignored him. “Thank you, Adrien.” She shifted on her feet and opened her mouth but shut it again.

“Has your husband started attending the parent-child interaction therapy sessions yet?” Adrien asked delicately. 

Beatrix wilted, as Adrien expected she would. “No. He’s still too angry about the diagnosis.”

 _That is the absolute worst,_ Adrien thought, holding back a sigh. _I hate it when parents reject their children’s issues rather than tackling the problem head on._

“My dad is an idiot,” Adam interjected. 

“He’s probably just scared, Adam,” Adrien said with a smile. Then he turned to Beatrix again. “PCIT is one of the best ways to train all of you to handle Adam’s disorder. Both parents attending would be ideal, but if you’re the only one willing and able to go, then…”

Adrien didn’t want to say that would be good enough. He couldn’t make that kind of promise. The hope shining in Beatrix’s eyes nearly killed him.

“Please remember to try and set clear limits. And be generous with your praise,” he prescribed. “Now let’s talk about at-home exercises for the sensory processing disorder…”

That talk ran long. Adrien barely had enough time to uncover the crash pit for his next client: a boisterous 3-year-old with self-regulation problems.

“Hi, Camille!” Adrien said, grinning from ear-to-ear as the girl burst into the room. Camillie’s beleaguered father stepped out to take a phone call, as he always did, and Adrien knew he wouldn’t be seeing the man until the end of the session.

“Crash pit, crash pit, crash pit!” she shrieked, and Adrien pointed to the giant ball pit resting across the gym. “Yaaaay!”

She leapt into the brightly-colored balls over and over, climbing out of the pit and springing in and climbing out and springing in and climbing out and springing in...

Camille usually liked to play alone--she was often lethargic and in her own world, not responding to her name or her parents trying to get her attention--but this time Adrien was able to engage her in conversation while she exhausted herself. She loved movement, and was constantly spinning and swaying and rocking, so when Adrien introduced her to the crash pit, he’d found the therapeutic tool that could draw her out of her shell.

By the time her father returned, Camille was well-regulated and on her way to a before-dinner nap. Her father expressed his gratitude to Adrien and carried her away. She waved goodbye at Adrien, which was progress over last session. 

Adrien decided he’d have to get to his 1pm session note later and moved mats around for the next session: a 5 ½-year-old boy with global developmental delays and a medical diagnosis of autism. Adrien and both the boy’s parents helped him button his coat, hold a pencil, and build a giant obstacle course.

 _My 2pm note will have to wait as well,_ Adrien thought, cleaning up the course. 

His next 4-year-old was obsessed with Peppa Pig and spoke in a British accent. The only word she could say in English was “tah-mah-toes,” so she repeated it over and over, much to her mother’s chagrin.

While Danielle finger painted, her mother ranted about Peppa. “That show is terrible. It flashes between scenes too quickly for a preschooler to follow. So their attention spans suffer.”

“Yep,” Adrien said, dipping his fingers in red paint. He was painting Ladybug swinging through the city. “And the conflicts are usually resolved at the end, so the child picks up the bad behaviors of the show rather than the problem-solving practices that are shoehorned in at the last few minutes.”

“It’s just awful,” the mother said. Adrien did not ask why she allowed her daughter to watch Peppa so often. Some parents needed a TV break, and Peppa was all that would keep Danielle’s attention.

“Tah-mah-toes!” Danielle said, and Adrien grinned at her. 

“I do not watch Peppa Pig, personally,” Adrien said, winking at her mom.

The woman blushed, and Adrien thought he’d gone too far. He wondered if she’d ask him out at the end of the session, like she’d done before.

To his relief, she didn’t, though the way she fidgeted and bit her lip showed him that she maybe wanted to.

His second to last session with a 10-year-old boy was fairly straightforward: Adrien addressed emotional control with the Zones of Regulation, a therapy tool with four different colors showing states of being. Unlike most sessions, the client stayed within the green zone--calm alertness--until he slipped into the yellow zone--anxiety, stress, and nervousness--while attempting to tie his shoes.

The last session was the _worst_.

Estelle was a 12 ½-year-old girl with no formal medical diagnosis, but she was nonverbal and developmentally delayed. After her mother left, Adrien approached Estelle, stress ball in hand, and she covered her ears and started shrieking. 

“Estelle,” Adrien said gently, holding his free hand up. “What’s wrong?”

She kept screaming out of nowhere. He couldn’t figure out why she was upset. He offered her the yoga ball. He offered her the crash pit. He offered her the resistance band.

Nothing helped.

Adrien didn’t want to offer her playdough or putty, because she’d tried eating some the last time she’d been upset. His usual approach was useless. 

And she didn't have a communication device. Some children had automated iPads that spoke, simple soundboards with limited phrases with a picture board of different symbols. Sometimes they worked, sometimes they didn't--whether they worked depended on how much the behavior was reinforced universally in the child's life and their mood.

It was strange that Estelle didn't have one to use. She was a fairly new client, so he hadn't suggested getting one to her parents yet. He'd have to talk to the Speech Language Pathologist about her.

Without a means of communication, he couldn’t figure out what the problem was.

She crouched to the floor and rocked, screaming hysterically with tears rolling down her cheeks. Adrien watched, helpless, from the sidelines.

Before he could blink, Estelle stood and darted to the sink. She seized the hand sanitizer and ripped the cap off, bringing the bottle to her lips. 

“No, Estelle!” Adrien cried, bolting over to her. He didn’t like to touch his clients unless they initiated, but he had to gently take her hands to extricate the bottle from her grip. 

All he could do was let her cry herself out and keep the hand sanitizer away from her. He was baffled and heartbroken, but he forced himself to keep a neutral expression on his face when he told her concerned mother what had happened.

 _Was it my fault?_ Adrien thought, as he finished his treatment notes from earlier in the day. _Did I cause her to be so upset? She was so sad. What did I do?_

Mulling over the problem, he sent follow-up emails to the parents from the day’s sessions. He made a to-do list for Monday, returned the client’s charts, and locked the clinic. He was the last to head home, as usual.

Estelle’s panic still bothered him as he ordered and ate pineapple fried rice. He was momentarily distracted by the fact that the restaurant had changed up the spices in the dish, and he wasn’t sure he was a fan.

Then he showered and prepared for what he’d been looking forward to all month: patrol with Marinette.

“Plagg, you lazy glutton,” Adrien teased as the kwami belched, lying on Adrien’s pillow next to an empty camembert box. Plagg didn’t come to Adrien’s job with him; the kwami preferred to stay home where cheese was always available and naps were easy to take. “You eat soooo much. How do you never gain weight?”

“I am a kwami of many talents,” Plagg said, languorously lifting a flipper and waving it around. He burped again. “Do we _have_ to patrol tonight?”

Adrien huffed. “Yes, we must. You only need to transform once a month, is that too much to ask?” When Plagg didn’t answer, merely pouted, Adrien called for his transformation with a sigh. “Claws out.”

He didn’t bother to go through his old poses. As an adult, clawing at the air seemed silly. 

Bringing his baton out from behind his back, he launched himself off across the city to the Eiffel Tower.

***

“... And Odette still keeps swiping my lunch,” Ladybug huffed, running her fingers through his hair while he lay in her lap, tail dangling off the edge of the Tower. “I know it’s her. It can’t be anyone else.”

“Have you tried telling her ‘Swiper, no swiping’?” Chat said, and Ladybug graced him with one of her beautiful laughs.

“You haven’t told me about your day, Kitty,” she said, running her finger along his feline ear. He shivered. “I’ve complained about mine. It’s your turn.”

Adrien sighed. He closed his eyes, luxuriating in her touch for a moment. While she’d talked about her day, he’d been able to forget about the Estelle Problem. 

“I had two really hard sessions today,” he started, opening his eyes to gaze into her sympathetic bluebell ones. “One was typical for the client--screamed at me for an hour. I can handle that. The other…”

“Yes?”

He sagged in her hold. “That session went really badly and my confidence is pretty shot now.”

“I’m sorry, Adrien,” Ladybug said gently, cupping his cheek.

“I just… feel like I should have been able to handle it. You know?” Adrien said, sighing again. “I couldn’t even figure out what she was upset about.”

Ladybug stroked his cheek with her thumb. “Kids are like that sometimes.”

“Most of them don’t try to drink hand sanitizer when they’re upset though,” Adrien joked, but the joke fell flat. “She eats things when stressed. She’s already tried to eat putty. But I couldn’t… I just couldn’t do anything to help her.”

“Adrien,” Ladybug said firmly, and he directed his attention back to her. “I want you to listen to me.” He nodded. “This is not your fault. Okay? Children regularly don’t communicate well, and you’re not a mind reader and you’re working with kids who have developmental delays besides.”

When he didn’t know what to say, she continued. “You’re there to help her. One bad day won’t ruin the good you’re doing for her in the long run.” 

“But...”

She smiled down at him, and he thought he could live there forever. “You’re amazing, Adrien Agreste. I couldn’t do what you do. You have to remain playful and happy in an emotionally and physically taxing environment.” 

“Yeah,” Adrien said, blinking up at her. “Yeah, I do. And that’s exhausting.”

She chuckled. “Absolutely! And you do it day after day after day. No wonder this one session sent you into a tailspin.”

Looking at her, Adrien felt a smile curl his lips. “Thanks, Bug.” 

“Anytime, Kitty,” Marinette said, pressing a kiss to his nose. 

Then she fidgeted. _Oh, no,_ Adrien thought. She only fidgeted when she had something to tell him. “What’s wrong, Marinette?”

“I was…” She glanced away and then back at him, biting her lip. “I was wondering if I could come to the clinic sometime for lunch? With you?”

“With me?” Adrien mumbled, feeling elated and out of place and confused all at once. “Like on a date?”

“It doesn’t have to be a date!” Marinette said, releasing him to wave her hands. Then she looked down at him under her lashes. “But… if you wanted to make it a date, I wouldn’t be opposed.”

Adrien sat up slowly so he wouldn’t crack her nose with his head. “Marinette,” he said, turning himself around to face her. He took her hands. “I would be honored to go to lunch with you.”

Marinette giggled. “Then you can introduce me to Janice and your other coworkers.”

“That’d be fantastic,” Adrien said, beaming. “They’d love to meet you.”

“Great,” Marinette said, and kissed his cheek. “It’s a date.”

Adrien’s day couldn’t have gone better.

**Author's Note:**

> Are you interested in reading or writing fanfiction? Are you looking for a community of like-minded and supportive people? Then join the [Miraculous Fanworks](https://discord.gg/mlfanworks) Discord server! 
> 
> We are always welcoming new members, and would love to see you. We offer a variety of conversations, from fic discussions to writing support to fanfiction prompts. We even have monthly server-wide events and group writing projects! 
> 
> Come join today!


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